We made it home! That’s the short story.
The longer story is that we had a pretty good drive today through some resplendent countryside, beginning in McCall, Idaho. We found this town to be quite charming and friendly. There’s Lake Payette for summertime water activities as well as ski resorts and a huge ice rink for winter sports of all kinds too. We’re definitely looking forward to returning soon.
From McCall, we drove northwest to the town of Lewiston Idaho, where we crossed into Washington. We spent most of the day on Highway 26 going through a few small towns along the way, but it was mostly farmland. Potatoes, onions and wheat. Fields as far as we could see on both sides of the road. It was easy driving for Marshall and we listened to a good book most of the time. A good way to wind down the trip.
At Vantage, we hopped on the interstate.
We soon realized we were going to hit Seattle—Tacoma rush hour traffic if we continued our course, so we stopped and had a late lunch/early dinner in North Bend.
Once we were done, it was still bad timing for traffic so we decided to go to Snoqualmie Falls and walk the path to the bottom of the falls for a little post-meal exercise. A ten minute drive from where we ate in North Bend. As we headed down the road we saw a sign “Elk Crossing Next 2 Miles”. We laughed because we’d seen signs like that for 2 weeks and wildlife usually was nowhere near them. Not this time! We rounded the corner and there in a lush green field right off the highway was an entire herd of elk
There were at least a dozen big bulls strutting around with their strong necks holding up gigantic racks of antlers, while the cows lounged around in the grass, batting their pretty eyelashes, just hoping to be chosen by the best male in the group.
They were magnificent.
We stood across the highway at a safe distance, along with a group of interested locals who, while enjoying the show, seemed pretty used to it.
After taking a few photos and admiring the herd for a while, we finished our journey to Snoqualmie Falls for our walk. It never disappoints. Isn’t it ironic that after 2 weeks of seeing the best wildlife and natural wonders that Canada and the United States have to offer we come home to be reminded that we have much of the same in our own backyard?
Not to discourage one from going to any of the places we’ve been the past two weeks. More to remind ourselves that, like Dorothy said, “there’s no place like home”.
We’re glad we got to go and it’s good to be back home after making so many memories together these past two weeks.
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